


Box of Love

by aserwq (orphan_account)



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Background Remus Lupin/Nymphadora Tonks - Freeform, Grief, M/M, Mention of a Blood Pact, Self-Loathing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-07
Updated: 2020-09-07
Packaged: 2021-03-06 07:01:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,488
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25709389
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/aserwq
Summary: On the eve of Remus's marriage with Tonks he reflects on his true love, Sirius. He thinks back to all the good times they had, and how fate doomed them.
Relationships: Sirius Black/Remus Lupin
Comments: 2
Kudos: 12
Collections: Wolfstar Hurt Fest





	Box of Love

The day before Remus marries Tonks, he decides he's going to clean up the house a little. After all, any romantic partner of his shouldn't live in a messy and filthy den just because he's gotten used to it. Besides, he's pretty sure that any child of Andromeda Tonks would disembowel anyone who was the cause of uncleanliness. He shoves aside the thought that he hasn't actually, seriously cleaned house since James and Lily died (how has it been so long? he hasn't meant to lose track of time, he swears) and gets to work. Magic does wonders, and soon the small house was neat and tidy with not even a thread out of place.

He finds a wooden box beneath his bed and pulls it out, waving his wand over it to remove the dust that clings to the outside. Opening it, he instantly chokes on his next breath of air because inside this box, it contains so many mementos of a past relationship that had burned with a passion that got smothered in mistaken suspicion. There is a photograph of himself and Sirius in their shared flat, their lips pressed together and their hands roaming over each other's sweaty skin. Sirius had had calluses on his hands from trying to shield himself from his parents' curses and beatings, and Remus' hands were rough from digging into the forest floor once a month, so it made their skin a perfect match, or so they'd liked to say. There is a silver chain with two charms, one of a wolf and one of a dog, which the two of them had carved themselves on a cool wintry day - a sweet sense of harmony in fellow canines. There is a photograph of the two of them holding up their pet, a white cat with the fluffiest fur Remus had ever seen because Sirius had said that he wanted to be the only dog in Remus's life, it died after Sirius was imprisoned. There is a sad attempt of a love poem that Sirius had written for Remus a month before he got thrown into Azkaban, and it waxed poetic about the scars on Remus' body and the kindness of his heart, and Remus had hung it up on the fridge until the news of James and Lily's death came and he tore it up (though he repaired the paper with magic a mere hour later). There is a short video of the two of them dancing on a glass floor, laughing like lunatics. There is a recording of the two of them singing lullabies to a then-infant Harry to try and get him to sleep. There is a shard of bottle-green glass that they'd used as teenagers to cut their palms and swear eternal love and loyalty to each other - what a joke that turned out to be, they'd fallen apart at the first sign of danger.

And this was the life, wasn't it? With Sirius all of his constraints went straight out of the window. His indecision, his need to be liked, his desires, his hatred, his love, his fears, none of that matters because all of that got swept up in the storm that was loving the brightest star in the sky. Stealing kisses under the stars, not knowing that they would be taken from you and all you would be left with were bittersweet memories. You'd talk about everything except love, and he would just nod and smile and wrap his arms around you so you felt his warmth. Warmth, you haven't felt that in a while, Tonks' hands are always cold. You remember asking him why he was so warm all the time and he said he wasn't warm, he was hot, didn't you know? No, you didn't know. You didn't know anything. Your love story was built on not knowing what would come next, and tossing your trust to the fates because nothing was going to go wrong when you had true friends by your side, right?

Curse the fates. There was so much between them that went unsaid, so many things they wanted to do but never did. So much want - Remus had wanted to hold Sirius forever and all he got was a moment, a moment when neither could move past the broken shards of their minds and hearts and souls that all got stripped away by this vicious war. The two of them had thought they were young and had all the time. No, they were not young anymore, and both had changed too much from the harsh experiences of life. Perhaps, when they reunite in a heaven with glassy clouds and pastel blue skies, Sirius can run his calloused hands over his skin again. And they can dance on glass again and pretend nothing will break. Remus will throw his arms around Sirius like he did at the shack, cry through an apology that is years too late, with their words toying with bloodshed and tears and their lips tasting like grief when they meet again. They won't hang onto nothing again, like they did when Sirius, darling Sirius, was rotting and half-mad in a torturous prison and Remus starves away in his dingy flat because he can't pay the bills and nobody wants to hire a dangerous werewolf. He fashions himself wings of hope covered in feathers of honesty and varnished with loneliness, and soars across the sunlit sky, and falls just as he knew he would.

Is there glass in his heart, or is it just breaking? He wonders if Sirius would approve of Tonks. They (and here is the clincher: this could apply to Sirius and Tonks, and Sirius and himself) weren't the closest before he died, thirteen years of being locked up in Azkaban and slandered as a traitorous murderer would do that to one. And once he was free, he'd spent the rest of his life locked up in his ancestral home where he'd gone through years of abuse from the hands of his horrid parents. That did a number on his mental health and Remus ended up not knowing how to talk to his oldest friend, his first love. The cruel reminder of that makes his legs turn to liquid and he sinks to the ground, gasping for breath that doesn't seem to come. The glass in his heart seems to have moved to his throat, cutting off his air. Shards pierce his heart as his lips begin to move, as though Sirius was there kissing him. He is not, and really Remus should be over this because he's literally getting married tomorrow to the most wonderful woman in the world, but the ghost of the most wonderful man in the world, covered in dust and filth and Wormtail's lies, has come back to haunt him tonight.

What would people say if they knew? Certainly, he would receive confused looks from the Order members, and maybe Molly would make some comment about his fickle heart. Sirius wouldn't have wanted him to become this sad husk of a man, but Remus has always been twisted around his little finger, and his life has only ever been something other than survival when he was with him. He thinks Tonks would understand - she, like him, is a hardened warrior who had lost those she loved best over and over. He'd told her straight off the bat that she was not going to be his only love, since there was always Sirius, and their story had never truly had a proper ending that brought closure. He'd told her that she wasn't going to be his first spouse either, as he and Sirius had gotten married right after graduation with Peter serving as the officiant. She'd nodded, pressed her hand to his heart, and said that she didn't mind if there was another in there as long as there was some room for her. Then he'd kissed her, and got down on one knee and proposed with a golden ring, the same way he had done to Sirius all those years ago.

Rummaging through the box, he saw a glint of gold. This was the most heartbreaking memento of all: his first ring, a ring with both their initials, and a phrase that James had often liked to say. "The ones that love us never truly leave us." Sirius had worn his with pride until it got pulled off his finger by Dementors. Blinking away impending tears, Remus kissed the wooden box before he sent it unceremoniously flying into a shadowy corner with a flick of his wand, before conjuring a piece of black cloth to drape over it. He would never throw away this box, and if Tonks asked, he would honestly answer her. But some things needed to stay in the past, and besides, he'd shed enough tears over Sirius, who had never appreciated his angst anyway.


End file.
